Influenced by the music of such bands as RX Bandits, Mad Caddies, and Rancid; The Upgrades is an incredibly talented five-piece ska punk band from Dublin. ‘Take A Risk’ is a supremely chilled out album effort from The Upgrades, with the band here showing a fantastic ability to combine powerful pop choruses with a laid back reggae/ska instrumental approach. The album has been fantastically well produced, with all elements of the music always here coming through incredibly cleanly.
Kicking off with intro track ‘The Thing Is’, the ‘Take A Risk’ album soon gets properly moving with ‘Rock’n’Fuck’n’Roll’, and never here does the album cease to impress as the band launches its way through the album. Of course there are some tracks here that are more successful than others, ‘Rock’n’Fuck’n’Roll’ being one of them, ‘Angel of Horror’, ‘Somethin, I Dunno…’, and closing track ‘This Is Us’ being several others. On the whole the band takes quite a soft approach to music here which works quite well, it is arguably the slightly harder hitting tracks that work out a little better however, with the band showcasing a little extra edge in these instances. The lead vocalist of The Upgrades has a great voice, and whatever style he chooses to sing it works well, with the tracks that I’ve picked out here his voice just seems to have a little extra spark however, and that is what separates these four tracks from the pack.
The Upgrades is a band that has been around for a number of years now, and in this time the band has played a number of high profile shows with such ska icons as The Beat and Neville Staple, as well as shows with a number of commercially successful rock/punk bands including Taking Back Sunday, Senses Fail, and Underoath. The band has a vast amount of experience, and this is something that most certainly shines through on the ‘Take A Risk’ album. The Upgrades is a band that plays its sound with a great deal of precision and confidence, and always this is a very good thing to find.
With the band having already achieved some degree of success, this is something that is sure to continue in the future as The Upgrades continues to grow in strength and stature as a band. The Upgrades is a band with the potential to go far; ska punk may not be as popular now as it was five or six years ago, even still, strong talent such as this is still sure to be spotted, and the fact that the band has enjoyed the success it has done suggests that people are well prepared to give this band a chance and give the music a listen.
For fans of ska punk the music of The Upgrades is highly recommended, and with the album available to listen to right now in its entirety over at Spotify, there really is no reason whatsoever not to give the ‘Take A Risk’ album at least one listen.
Label: SYWP Records
Release Date: May 4th 2009
Rating:
UK based film graduate with a huge passion for music, sports and video games.
